katealaurel

One more quick status update before I go:

1) Yesterday Narin took me into the city proper for the first time, which was excellent. (She was joking about having no practice being a tour guide in Antep, but she was really helpful.) I now have the beginnings of an understanding of how the bus system works in this city, and a rudimentary knowledge of how to get around downtown. I’m looking forward to exploring next weekend. We also saw the city archaeological museum, which has the spectacular mosaics from Zeugma (as well as some other truly excellent finds, although the English signage is extremely limited)– I’m looking forward to going back when not feeling nauseous from poor sleep and adjusting to the sun.

2) Today, Narin had a… lunch party, I guess? Several friends of hers– colleagues from the university– came over for food and spent the afternoon half-watching tv and half-talking and making fun of each other. Like everyone I’ve met here, they were extremely friendly, although the vast majority of the conversation was in Turkish that flew by too fast for me to understand anything but a word or two (not that I do much better with slow Turkish). Two of the women live in the same apartment building very close to the university, and said there’s a vacancy on their floor. It looks like I might have a place within a few days of getting back from the meeting in Ankara.

3) Still not totally clear on what I’m supposed to be teaching tomorrow, although at least I’ve finally gotten a look at the textbook. I guess it’s a good thing the classes aren’t until 5:30pm.

4) I’m optimistic that someone at Fulbright orientation will be able to help me figure out what on earth is going on with my computer. If not, I will be frustrated, and begin hunting for computer nerds in Antep.

5) You all thought my caffeine consumption was bad. Well, the standard for this afternoon’s party was a cup of Turkish coffee (Türk kahve) with attendant fortune-telling, followed by multiple (2-4 each) glasses of strong Turkish tea, followed by a glass of cola. Aaaah. Also, per-guest dessert was an enormous slice of heavily-iced/chocolated/pistachio’d fluffy cake, plus 8-10 cookies. (At least nobody else finished all of theirs either, although I was by far the weakest contender.) I cannot keep up with the middle east, guys.

Explanatory Turkish Phrasebook, Episode Bir

ayip olmasa: “If it’s not rude–” As Narin put it, Turks are too curious not to ask, but at least they’re going to be polite about it. Apparently I should expect to hear this frequently from my students.